Jon Ronson is a writer and broadcaster whose award-winning podcast and Radio 4 series Things Fell Apart investigated the stories behind today’s culture wars. His television programmes and books – from Them: Adventures with Extremists to So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed - explore what he calls “the worlds that are going on underground” and his subjects - from conspiracy theorists to internet trolls - inhabit the fringes of society.

Jon was born in Cardiff in 1967. He started a media studies degree at the Polytechnic of Central London but left after two years to become the keyboard player for the musician and comedian Frank Sidebottom’s Oh Blimey Big Band. He also managed the Manchester indie band Man from Delmonte.

He worked as a presenter on KFM Radio with Terry Christian, Caroline Aherne and Craig Cash before moving back to London where he wrote for the listings magazine Time Out and later produced a weekly column about family life for the Guardian.

In 1993 he began his television career with a BBC series called the Ronson Mission which he describes as having little adventures and interviewing people who were classed as outsiders by the mainstream. He went on to make programmes about the Ku Klux Klan, the Jesus Christians cult and the First Earth Battalion about a secret New Age unit which was set up within the US Army in the late 1970s.

In 2012 Jon moved to New York. He became an American citizen in 2020.

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